posted 08-22-2016 11:59 AM                       

quote: Harold Hallikainen

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There were several television innovations that did not work out. For example, the Interactive Video Data Service (http://mai.hallikainen.org/org/FCC/FccRules/1997/95/803/ ) was supposed to allow you to order pizza from your TV.

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posted 08-27-2016 10:38 PM                       

quote: Daily Wail

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Mountain top could be BLOWN UP to stop freak winds which prevent planes from landing at a £300m South Atlantic airport funded by British taxpayers

It was labelled the 'worst foreign aid project in living memory': a £300 million airport funded by British taxpayers – where planes couldn't land.

Now, in a bid to solve the problem of wildly fluctuating winds at the clifftop airfield on the tiny island of St Helena, desperate officials plan to blow the top off a mountain to make the airport safer.

The drastic move is one option being discussed to counter wind shear – vicious changes in wind speed and direction – at the airport on the British territory in the South Atlantic.



Prince Edward was due to open the airport earlier this year, but it was delayed after test flights raised safety concerns.

Authorities had hoped the problem could be fixed quickly, but engineers are now understood to be considering blowing up King and Queen Rock, a peak on the side of the northern approach to the runway, to reduce the danger risk.

This would take months and involve moving thousands of tons of rock.

Last night the Department for International Development (DFID) said it had appointed an internal expert to review the project, though it refused to confirm or deny whether dynamiting was a viable option.

The Mail on Sunday can also reveal that politicians in the UK have demanded an inquiry into the farce after a leaked email revealed a Foreign Office official admitting that continuing delays mean commercial flights will not land at St Helena before August 2017 – costing taxpayers at least £2.5 million extra.

The delay will force DFID to pay Comair, a British Airways subsidiary that won a contract to provide flights to the island, up to £1.9 million a year to cover its loss of revenue.

The island's government has said continuing to run the island's supply ship, RMS St Helena, over the period could cost at least £625,000.

Last night, Lord Foulkes of Cumnock, an ex-DFID Minister who previously branded the scheme 'the worst foreign aid project in living memory', said: 'The whole project is a real embarrassment and I have written to the chairman of the International Development Committee to demand an inquiry. The committee should discuss compensation for people who have put money into commercial interests tied to the airport.'

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posted 11-04-2016 09:27 PM                       

quote: Daily Wail again (sorry)

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Is human POOP the future of fuel? Researchers reveal radical system to turn sewage into oil

Fuel of the future could soon be generated from a resource that's found aplenty – human waste.

Researchers have developed a way to turn sewage into biocrude oil, using a process known as hydrothermal liquefaction to produce a material similar to the petroleum pumped from the ground.

With roughly 34 billion gallons of sewage treated in the US every day, the researchers say this system could create up to 30 million barrels of oil each year.

Scientists at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory say the technology mimics the processes that naturally produce crude oil over millions of years.

But, it does so at high temperature and pressure, allowing for much faster output.

According to the researchers, the resulting biocrude oil can then be refined with conventional petroleum refining operations.

And, they say future systems using the technology could make for sustainable wastewater operations, with zero net energy, zero odours, and zero residuals.

While it’s long been thought that sewage sludge is too wet to generate biofuel, the approach used by the researchers at PNNL solves many of the previous problems.

It eliminates the need for drying, which has been known to make such conversions energy intensive and expensive.

With hydrothermal liquefaction, human waste or even other types of wet organic products, like agricultural waste, could be broken down into simpler chemical compounds, they say.

The researchers estimate that just one person could create two to three gallons of biocrude oil in a year.

To create the material, the waste is pressurized to 3,000 pounds per square inch, and subsequently fed into a reactor system that’s heated to roughly 660 degrees Fahrenheit.

The combination of these extreme conditions causes the cells of the waste material to break down into biocrude oil and an aqueous liquid phase.

And, the biodrude oil isn't the only useful product.

The liquid phase could be treated with a catalyst to create other fuels and chemical products, the researchers say.

Along with this, the process also generates a small amount of solid material, which contains important nutrients including phosphorous, which could help to replace the phosphorous ore used in fertilizer production.

‘There is plenty of carbon in municipal waste water sludge and interestingly, there are also fats,’ said Corinne Drennan, who is responsible for bioenergy technologies research at PNNL.

‘The fats or lipids appear to facilitate the conversion of other materials in the wastewater such as toilet paper, keep the sludge moving through the reactor, and produce a very high quality biocrude that, when refined, yields fuels such as gasoline, diesel, and jet fuels.’

The researchers say that this process could also help local governments save money by eliminating the need for sewage residuals processing, transport, and disposal.

‘The best thing about this process is how simple it is,’ Drennan said. ‘The reactor is literally a hot, pressurized tube.

‘We’ve really accelerated hydrothermal conversion technology over the last six years to create a continuous, and scalable process which allows the use of wet wastes like sewage sludge.’

In an independent examination for the Water Envionmental & Reuse Foundation, the process has been hailed a potential option for treating wastewater solids, and the investigators have even said it has high carbon conversion efficiency with nearly 60 percent of the available carbon becoming bio-crude.

The technology has now been licensed to Utah-based Genifuel Corporation, and is working with Metro Vancouver – including 23 local authorities in British Columbia, Canada – to build a demonstration plant.

Officials say the pilot project will cost between $8 and $9 million, and they have plans to see a start-up occur in 2018.

According to Darrell Mussatto, chair of Metro Vancouver’s Utilities Committee, ‘If this emerging technology is a success, a future production facility could lead the way for Metro Vancouver’s wastewater operation to meet its sustainability objectives of zero net energy, zero odours, and zero residuals.’

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posted 11-24-2016 02:23 PM                       

quote: Daily Wail (predictable, aren't I?)

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Terrified driver who was decapitated in crash made an EIGHT-MINUTE 999 call as his Skoda sped along motorway at 119mph after car's cruise control 'got stuck'

A driver phoned 999 as his car sped down a motorway at 119mph after the cruise control locked, an inquest heard.

Kaushal Gandhi, 32, of Harrow, Middlesex, desperately tried to stop the out-of-control Skoda Octavia before it crashed into a parked lorry, killing him instantly.

In the eight minutes leading up to the collision, Mr Gandhi told the call handler that the cruise control had become stuck and he could not stop the car accelerating.

A recording of the panicked phone call was played to a coroner in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire, today.

The inquest heard company director Mr Gandhi, described as a 'meticulous' driver, speaking to the Thames Valley Police call handler as passed Junction 2 of the M40.

He said: 'My car is not coming out of cruise control...It is not letting me stop. It (the speedometer) shows 70mph but I think I am going much faster than this.'

The call handler replied: 'Can you try to control the car's speed using your gears?'

Mr Gandhi said: 'I am trying. It is not stopping at neutral.'

He tried to turn off the engine by pressing the start-stop button before continuing: 'I have kept pressing the button but all it makes is a noise, my speed is increasing.

'I think what has happened was I tried to change the mode on the car, because I was on the sports mode. I pressed a button to come onto the normal mode and then it is not allowing me to do anything.'

Mr Gandhi later said his speed had 'just gone 77mph' before the call handler asked if he had tried using the handbrake.

The driver said: 'I haven't tried it because at this speed I am not sure what will happen. I am in the middle lane right now, there is no traffic.. Do you want me to try the hand brake?'

The call handler, who was then seeking advice from a colleague, got no response to a question and the crash then happened.

The coroner heard that the phone connection was lost moments after Mr Gandhi was heard saying: 'I am just going to check that, one second... '

The call handler was then heard saying: 'Are you still there? Hello, operator, I've lost the line.'

The Skoda crashed into a lorry parked in a lay-by after the M40 merged into the A40 shortly after 3am on February 2.

Witness Robert Hague, who phoned emergency services, told the inquest the car was 'almost completely embedded in the lorry' and the roof was 'peeled back'.

Lorry driver Emma Parrot told the inquest she was thrown from her bunk with the force of the impact, adding: 'I realised immediately that anyone in the white car was unlikely to have survived.'

Martin Clatworthy, a vehicle data examiner and safety safety specialist for Volkswagen, the makers of Skoda, told the inquest that in the five seconds before the crash, the vehicle was travelling at 116mph and the accelerator pedal was fully depressed. He added there was no braking recorded.

Mr Clatworthy said: 'There is no indication that there was any error or problem with any of the electronic systems of the car in the five seconds leading up to the collision.'

Police collision investigator Andrew Evans said the faults Mr Gandhi described would have meant the Skoda suffered a simultaneous mechanical and electronic failure.

He explained that applying the handbrake could have saved Mr Gandhi's life by forcing the car's rear wheels to lock up and turn it around so it skidded backwards.

Family friend Gatinder Kaur said Mr Gandhi had been 'like a son' and a 'close and trusted friend.

Mrs Kaur said Mr Gandhi, who was born in Mumbai, India, had many interests including archery and sky diving. He had also recently reconnected with an ex-girlfriend in India after his marriage ended in February 2015.

Mrs Kaur said the breakdown of the relationship did not 'cause him any concerns', adding: 'He was on top of the world, he had everything to live for.'

The coroner said a post-mortem examination at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford gave the cause of death as multiple injuries. A toxicology report showed no substances that would affect Mr Gandhi's driving in his blood at the time.

Senior coroner Cripsin Butler said that data analysis from the mangled car's airbag systems failed to provide evidence of the defects Mr Gandhi was describing to the call handlers. He recorded a narrative verdict.

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